Jean Guiart’s Contacts culturels

Abstract

J. Guiart’s analysis of the John Frum Movement, published as Un siècle et demi de contacts culturels à Tanna, was the first in a series of ethnographic monographs that tackled post-war social movements in the Southwest Pacific. Following the Pacific War, anthropological attention had shifted from the description of functionally coherent communities to investigation of crisis, breakdown, and social transformation. Guiart likewise turned to history and “culture contact” to explain post-war social agitation as the consequence of detrimental acculturation. This article explores the scholarship and professional contacts which influenced Guiart’s John Frum account and the broader historical context. Guiart’s ethnography on Tanna combined a description of island culture and a history of events that sparked the John Frum movement. Applying ethnographic research to inform colonial policy, Guiart diagnosed the causes of John Frum, prescribed therapy to remedy the movement, and offered several prognoses regarding its future. Culture contact triggered the movement, but more and better-designed culture contact might cure it.